


Creideamh Sí

by von_gelmini



Category: Irish Mythology, Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Allegory, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Endgame Allegory, Irish Mythology - Freeform, Ladyhawke but sadder because there's no Matthew Broderick character, M/M, No deaths but..., Sidhe, Unhappy Ending, and i made myself cry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22526020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/von_gelmini/pseuds/von_gelmini
Summary: Peter knew of war. He lost his father to it. Michelle now carried his mantle. He lost his mother to its aftermath. He now gathered berries and baked bread alone. He hoped that before they left the world, someone had cared for them. Had offered them a drink of cool water, had tried to tend their wounds.
Relationships: Peter Parker/Tony Stark
Kudos: 13





	Creideamh Sí

**Author's Note:**

> I'm playing ridiculously fast and loose with Irish Mythology here. Don't look here for accuracy. My grandmother would have my head if she knew how badly I was messing things up.
> 
> And I'm also breaking the metaphor of the light colors and the Infinity Stones and just about everything else. Sit back and just pretend it all makes sense, 'k?

* * *

Like every Creideamh Sí in the county, Peter left his offering just before twilight at the altarstone of the daylit woods, to the Sidhe who dwelled therein. Like his mother before him, like his grandmother before her, like his great-grandfather before her, and back as far as anyone could remember. Back farther. 

His sister Michelle was of a warrior bent. As a young girl she rode with their father. Peter gathered berries and apples and baked at the hearth with their mother to make the offering. Peter was known for his devotion and for the light that he seemed to carry within him. He was a good and obedient child and had grown into a strong and faithful young man. He listened to the tales of the elders. He took their cautions seriously. And he walked without pause, without glance, past the nightlit woods where the Dubh Sidhe dwelled. 

As he returned a little too late, only the top point of the sun’s disk remained above the hill. Peter saw a war rage within the nightlit woods. Lights of many colors flashed and streaked from tree to tree, down into the earth, and up into the sky to the stars above. 

Peter knew of war. He lost his father to it. Michelle now carried his mantle. He lost his mother to its aftermath. He now gathered berries and baked bread alone. He hoped that before they left the world, someone had cared for them. Had offered them a drink of cool water, had tried to tend their wounds. For while people could be cruel — war was a testament to that; people could be kind — faith was a testament to that. 

After Peter filled the crevice in the altarstone with food, when he’d left it in the four corners, when he’d dropped berries on the ground for those to small yet to reach the top — for surely the Sidhe had children still reaching up, not yet able to put their hands upon the table — there was always offering left in his basket. He usually took that to the families who were less fortunate than he was. But tonight there was a war.

He hadn’t the courage, or the foolhardiness, to  _ enter _ the nightlit woods, but he left his basket at the edge, between a pair of thin and twisting trees. A gateway where the fabric was thin, where what survivors there were come the dawn could find respite.

The next day, Peter left late in the afternoon for the altar at the daylit woods. He’d baked twice as many small loaves and picked berries until his fingers bled from the thorns. Not to neglect those to whom he’d been devoted his whole life, and feeling guilty that he shared his labor at all, he piled the altarstone high. And hoped, as he watched the lights begin to rage in the woods over the hill, that no one would begrudge what he took back there with him.

The basket he left the twilight before was empty. Peter filled it again and prayed that what passed for good within the nightlit woods would prevail. He knew he should head straight home. There was still much work to be done. But he had left dinner in the pot for his sister to find, and there would still be much work to be done even if he rushed right home. There was a path of trees, gnarled and knotted, but the path was straight without crossing or bend. He sat and watched the battle as it lit up the sky. Violet prevailed over all the colors. All the colors save red. Though Peter hadn’t paid much attention to the lights the night before, he was certain that red was stronger and shot up higher to the sky, heading for a far distant star.

Many days passed, and many nights. Peter’s sister chided him for working so hard. He was becoming thin, saving much of his portion of dinner for his basket. When he was home after the lights quieted, he sewed the new cloth he bought with the money he’d been saving. It was a deep red, redder than blood. Red, the color of the light that shot through the sky towards that star. Red, the color that drove the violet deeper into the nightlit woods, farther away from the daylit and mortal realms.

Michelle made a warding sign when she saw Peter leave — not the next day, but the next twilight — dressed in his new robes. She laughed at his new devotion as he wore a circle of iron on a string around his neck. The Sidhe were repelled by iron. Peter had no answer for her. No more than he had answer for why his robes went from earthen brown to red darker than blood. No more than he has answer for why he no longer visited the altarstone of the daylit woods.

All wars must end, Peter knew this. But sometimes the end was worse than the war itself, carrying away with it the wives of the warriors like his mother had been carried away. Though he had no reason for his belief, he knew that the Sidhe of the red light took the food he left every night. He knew that the banner of their King carried a circle of iron. He knew that the Sidhe fighting under such a banner had to be strong, strong enough to draw power  _ to  _ and not  _ away  _ from the loathed metal.

Peter left the straight path with the gnarled and knotted trees and sat beside the gateway pair. He kept vigil until he fell asleep. When he woke his basket was empty, the sun was cresting over the hill, and the lights were quiet.

When he went into the village for flour and salt, the shopkeepers still sold to him but they didn’t speak. They checked his coins for marks. They didn’t meet his dark and hollow eyes. Michelle moved out of their home. Peter’s late hours were impossible to live with. She couldn’t bear to see the changes in her beloved brother and he wouldn’t listen to her voice of reason. He tried to explain how important his new devotion was. Important to the fate of the world. To the fate of  _ all  _ worlds, sunlit, nightlit, and the world on which mortals walked. But he didn’t have the words to make her understand. He only had his faith.

Peter sold his parents’ belongings, one by one, to buy books and secret papers teaching the power of the Dubh Sidhe. Balance in the battle had shifted. He woke well before dawn over two weeks ago and the sky glowed purple. The green had been vanquished, the red had been dimmed. But without knowledge, he couldn’t help the nightlit woods. He bought more books and he read. 

His rest at the gateway was fitful. Many nights his basket was still full but the food in it had been corrupted. When Peter’s offering was fouled a third night in a row, a small silver chain that had belonged to Peter’s grandmother was sold and a large iron cauldron purchased. Instead of picking berries and baking bread, he took his father’s hatchet into the mortal woods and cut fuel for the fire. He set the cauldron between the trees where his basket had been. He put ten berries in front of it, too close to the other side of the gateway, but Peter had learned the words that let him pass his offering between the trees. He lit the fire. It burned from twilit dusk until twilit dawn. He slept, but never long enough to let the fire go out. Every night for five nights, the purple light settled heavily over the nightlit woods. 

The sixth night the colors raged again, as strong as they had been the first night Peter saw them. Only, his beloved red was missing. But his food had been taken, so he set the fire aside and made more to nourish the nightlit army. 

A golden light brought the red back to the woods, and the battle raged fiercer than ever. Despite the sound of horrors from within the nightlit woods, exhausted, Peter fell asleep against a gateway tree. He woke when someone fell against him. 

The man slid down the tree, bridging the gateway between nightlit and mortal worlds. Burned and weak and heavily bound down by his red iron armor that Peter knew he’d worn before with ease, despite being made of the loathsome metal. The Dubh Sidhe didn’t have a glow within them like their lighter cousins. But in the center of the man’s chest, beneath his torn and tattered armor was a glow, struggling to stay lit.

Peter stood in the gateway with the man, bent over him. He looked up into the sky and saw not a single light at war.

“You won,” he told the man, crying. He pressed his hand over the fading circle of light. He stretched himself out across the man, cupping his unscarred cheek with his hand. He looked into his unfocused eyes. “You won.”

“Peter.”

He wasn’t sure he heard it or if it was just the wind moving around the bends and twists of the trees. Or if it was just a wishful thought.

“I’m here.” He pressed a light kiss to the man’s lips. “I never left you. Don’t leave me.” Again he kissed him. And again. One hand caressing his face, the other pressed between them, light disk on his palm, iron disk on the back.

When Peter woke, twilit dawn was there. The sun was almost entirely over the hill. And he slumped alone against the gateway tree. He looked down at his hands, they were ashen as they stuck out from the sleeves of his red darker then blood robes. 

A handsome, unscarred and unarmored man bent down next to him. 

“I have to return to the daylit woods,” he said sadly to Peter.

“I will come with you.” Peter’s voice was strained with exhaustion still.

“The things you learned… they cannot be brought to the other side of the hill,” the man said. “Without the things you learned, neither side, nor hill itself would be here. But I cannot take you with me.”

“Oh,” Peter said sadly, tears falling. “But I love you.”

“And I love you.”

“You do?”

“Of course I do Peter. We won the war, but I can’t stay with you to enjoy the victory. It cost us both what we wish we hadn’t had to pay.”

“Take this,” Peter said, untying the string from around his neck, pressing the iron circle into the man’s hand.

“I can’t touch…” he began, about to protest how the Sidhe couldn’t touch iron. But in his palm the ring sat. He took the light from his chest.

“You need that!” Peter objected.

“There is light everywhere I am going.”

“I can’t take it with…” Peter cupped the light in his hand and it didn’t fade.

The bottom of the sun’s disk rested on the top of the hill.

The man looked beyond the gateway trees. When Peter followed his gaze, he saw the host of the Dubh Sidhe there.

“Take care of him,” the man said.

“Visit my sister’s house,” Peter called after the man. “Her new wife is Creideamh Sí. You will find an offering there.”

The woman with strawberry blonde hair and the dark skinned man led Peter away into the nightlit woods and away from the dawn. When he looked back, the veil had dropped between the gateway trees and nothing but night was there. The only light was the glow that settled in a circle, hung from the cord around his neck.

**Author's Note:**

> [Creideamh Sí](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aos_S%C3%AD#Creideamh_S%C3%AD) is Irish for the "Fairy Faith"
> 
> * * *
> 
> My Starker blog on tumblr is [starker-stories](https://starker-stories.tumblr.com/).  
> Come on by and visit.


End file.
